International pressure appears to have failed to deter the Myanmar military – Tatmadow – from attacking and killing its own people. It carried out a series of mass killings of civilians in July that resulted in the deaths of at least 40 men, an investigation by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has revealed.
It’s thought that the killings were a collective punishment for attacks by militia groups demanding a return to democracy following a military coup in February this year. A spokesman for the military government did not deny the allegations.
According to eyewitness accounts soldiers, some as young as 17, rounded up villagers before separating the men and killing them. The killings took place in July, in four separate incidents in Kani Township – an opposition stronghold in Sagaing District in Central Myanmar.
The mass killings are just a latest reflection of the cruelty of the Myanmar military which faces genocide charges in the International Criminal Court (ICC), The Hague, for persecution of ethnic minority Rohingya Muslims forcing over a million of them to flee to neighbouring Bangladesh.
The military chief Senior-General Min Aung Hlaing was condemned internationally in 2017 for the alleged “genocide”, and in the following year the UN Human Rights Council said: “Myanmar’s top military generals, including him must be investigated and prosecuted for genocide in the north of Rakhine State, as well as for crimes against humanity and war crimes in Rakhine, Kachin and Shan States.”
The US sanctioned him twice – in 2019 for his alleged role in “ethnic cleansing” and human rights violations, and in July 2020 the UK also imposed sanctions on him.
The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) in September did close the door of the grouping’s annual summit to the head of Myanmar’s military junta, held in Jakarta on the ground of undermining the principles of democracy.
The United Nations General Assembly recently called for a halt in the international flow of arms to Myanmar, and urged the military to respect the results of a November 2020 election and release political detainees. And US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken has of late hinted that they are examining the question of declaring the Rohingya persecution by the Myanmar military as genocide.
But no amount of pressure created so far has worked against the military hunger to govern Myanmar which has continued for more than five decades since 1962. The international community, particularly the US must do more to stop the Myanmar military junta from butchering people at will, throwing Rohingyas out of the country as refugees. Surely the civilised world cannot tolerate such a stark violation of human rights through recklessly killing opponents and burning villages.
The US as strong supporter of human rights must form an alliance to teach the corrupt and fat army of Myanmar a lesson by military intervention. The army in Myanmar think that to rule is their birth right because of their gun power and can do away with anything unpunished.
